This invention relates to the field of fiber optic component assembly and more specifically to the area of actuator design for use in alignment of fiber optic components.
In order to provide cheaper optical network devices the manufacturing costs associated with the assembly of each optical network device must decrease. During optical network device assembly a fiber is attached to the device to provide light to or from the device.
Conventional means of assembling optical network components utilize slow and expensive high precision mechanical 3 axis positioning stages. Typically the Z-axis determines the focusing of the optical system and the X and Y directions ensure capturing of the light as the optical component is physically brought in closer to the optical network device during assembly.
In some cases 5 or 6 axis positioners are used, where the added angular degrees of freedom result in better alignment. Positioning stages like these are able to compensate for angle and position thereby allowing for further reduction in optical losses. A drawback of using conventional 5 or 6 axis stages is that they are more difficult to align than three axis stages and have a significantly higher cost.
Typically, the aforementioned positioning stages offer high precision, high repeatability, high rigidity but suffer drawbacks such as alignment speed and cost of acquisition. It would therefore be advantageous to offer an inexpensive positioning stage capable of fast actuation as well as sufficient motion in all directions to allow for coarse and fine positioning of an optical component for the purpose of optical alignment.
Alignment is usually performed manually subject to human error and human operator speed. Automated systems exist but are generally based on manual positioning actuator design and as such suffer many similar drawbacks.
It is therefore an object of this invention to provide a fast and inexpensive six-axis optical component actuation mechanism capable of high frequency alignment.
In accordance with the invention there is provided an alignment mechanism for aligning a component in two axes, comprising:
at least two magnetic stator assemblies, each comprising a magnetic stator for providing a magnetic flux;
at least two electromagnetic coil assemblies, each comprising an electromagnetic coil for interacting with the magnetic flux, the electromagnetic coil assembly in spaced relation to the magnetic stator forming a gap therebetween;
a carriage mounted to two assemblies from the at least two electromagnetic coil assemblies and the at least two magnetic stator assemblies;
a control circuit for providing a control signal to the electromagnetic coil to displace it a controllable distance relative to the magnetic stator assembly; and,
wherein the carriage is controllably movable in rotation about and translation along at least two different axis.
In accordance with another embodiment of the invention there is provided a method of positioning a component in a rotational direction about a first axis and in a translational direction parallel to a second other axis, comprising the step of:
varying the intensity and polarity of a control signal applied to each of a pair of electromagnetic actuators fixed to a same carriage at two different locations thereon to control the magnitude and direction of displacement of the carriage along the second other axis and to control the magnitude and direction of rotation of the carriage along about the first axis wherein the displacement and rotation is relative to a pair of magnets each proximate one electromagnetic actuator from the pair of electromagnetic actuators.